British Gas

[toasty]

Oh my god.

So I pay my bills by monthly payment plan by direct debit.

I get my gas and electric both from British Gas, they set the payments, I just pay them.

Quite aside from the fact that they charge me £30 for ages so I get massively in debt with them (£700) then up them to £150 which will surely put them in my debt soon enough. To be honest I can live with that.

What has really annoyed me is a letter saying I owe them £65. When I phone them they say it's a computer error and that I shouldn't worry, then the following day I get a more irate letter saying I will be disconnected, so I phone again, they reassure me, cancel and set up another direct debit and so the cycle continues.

I'm just fed right up with it now.

What part of 'you collect the money from me via direct debit' don't they understand?????????!!!!!!

I never complain, even about the ridiculous payment plan and the wildly changing amounts each month.

all I want is for them to sort themselves out and take the money that they want from my account.

I don't want to spend hours on hold waiting to speak to yet another customer centre rep who'll tell me it's a computer errror and not my fault and it will all be sorted, because they seem incapable of actually sorting it out.

I am so cross, they are completely useless.

Rubbish, absolute rubbish.

 

[JohnD]

Write them a letter.

 

[Steve]

I never understand why energy companies make you pay a fixed amount each month and have outstanding credits or debits on each months bill. Why not just pay the whole amount up front? Does it cost them more to vary the amount taken from your account? There must be a reason!

And it avoids the situation where they raise the direct debit amount in january because the last 2 bills have been higher due to it being winter. Why dont they realise it will even out in summer when we use less energy?!?!?!

 

[toasty]

yeah it's ridiculous.

They charged me £30 per month for about a year, when I reckon I use more like £80-90 per month, so I get £700 in debt with them , then they up the payments to £165 so within 6 months I'll be in the oppisite position.

It's not even that though, it's the letters and threats of cutting me off for not paying a bill that they should be collecting via DD.

In any case, they can lick my hoop, I've just changed suppliers incompetence makes by blood boil.

british gas?? British a$$ more like!! I feel better already, you know when you just feel powerless, and the very best you'll acheive is to get things back to how they should be?? I'll never get an apology or any compensation, but yet I've spent hours on the phone now, and in fairness it's ruined a couple of evenings for me , just because it makes me so annoyed.

It's just not fair that they can do this.

 

[vokera80e]

and why do we have to pay 5p a minute to tell em about it ?. it should be a 0800 number ......rip off britain...

 

[toasty]

I hadn't even thought of that, the theiving monkeys.

They can suck my bottom twice then.

I am cross with a capital C

 

[securespark]

they can lick my hoop,

They can suck my bottom twice then.

 

[plastered]

love the imagery. Plan to fit these phrases into daily life for the rest week.

 

[masona]

Seeboards had upped my electric payments from £45 to £95 per month, I got a lot of catching up to do

I think this is a clever rip off, so you can't work it out the average payments.

 

[Nige F]

A sphincter as big as a hoop Hoop-La

 

[keyplayer]

Why not just pay the whole amount up front?

Are you sure???

 

[johnny_t]

I have BG's 3-star cover which a few years ago, I agreed to extend to cover three household appliances as well, namely my oven, washing machine and dishwasher. Though I don't really want it, I have kept it going because my washing machine has sounded like the drum is going to burst out of the case at any moment for the last two years, and I want it mended when it does (or at least that would have been worthwhile if it had broke two years ago when it sounded like it was about to).

Anyhoo, last weekend my dishwasher broke down, so I called them out and they said they would come Wednesday afternoon (12 - 6). Fine, but could they try to avoid 3.30 - 3.50, as my wife would be out at school. No problem, they will put a note on the system for the engineer not to call then.

Imagine, therefore, our joy when my wife came home to find a note in the door saying they had called at 3.44 and found no-one in.

So, a quick call to BG, and they claim not to have had any note on their system, that in fact their system doesn't even support having notes on, and that the whole note thing must have been imagined. They then rebooked for Friday afternoon, and as a special favour said they would tie it down to between 2 and 4. I have Friday afternoons off, so we couldn't possibly fall foul of the school run this week.

So it got to 4, no sign of the man from BG. Called the call centre, and apparently no record of any call out being booked to my house at all, presumably because the dishwasher had spontaneously self-fixed after the first call out. And they certainly couldn't tie down a time to two hours, so the fact I believe I had one probably proves I dreamt the whole rebooking process.

Now, I understand that mistakes will happen, but it really ****es me off that the first assumption is that I am some sort of fantasist that enjoys having a reason to moan, rather than working appliances.

Anyone know how to hasten the demise of my washing machine ??

 

[Steve]

Why not just pay the whole amount up front?

Are you sure???

I mean the whole of each bill!

Didn't you keep track of how much was outstanding each month and think "hmm i'd better phone up and make a payment / up the standing order before it gets to hundreds"

 

[oilman]

and why do we have to pay 5p a minute to tell em about it ?. it should be a 0800 number ......rip off britain...

You don't, billing enquiries is avable on 0800 0281028.

 

[toasty]

To be honest, whether I owe them hundreds or not really matters not to me, even if they can't budget my electricity usage.... I can

I'm happier having the money in my account, and not theirs.

It's the customer service and general incompetance that has riled me.

My advice would be to complain, I did today and got £50 put on my account, so please do the same if you have an issue.

In any case, I've switched to another company now anyway, I can't bear bad service, so british gas have seen the last of me, and I'll be slating them to all my friends, £50 is nice but I've spent a good 2 hours on the phone to them in the last week, so it's not really much compensation.